HOT SPOT 英國錦鯉愛好會東南俱樂部. The E-Mag of the South East Koi Club. Koi shows in decline? About Hot Spot. Issue 48 September Inside this issue:

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1 HOT SPOT 英國錦鯉愛好會東南俱樂部 The E-Mag of the South East Koi Club September 2010 Inside this issue: MSB Show 2-5 South East Show 7-11 NVN Show Innovation & immitation 19 Show dates 20 Photographs in this issue courtesy of :- Rene Gerritzen Christine Woolger Hazel Emery Laurence McConnel Des Harris Gregg Harris Bernie Woollands Maize Lo Koi shows in decline? There s been so much doom and gloom posted on the UK s koi forums about the decline in koi shows and their attendance that many a show committee were beginning to believe it. Thankfully, recent shows have bucked this trend and proved that if a show is worth going to the koi faithful will attend. One of the UK s clubs, the Crouch Valley Section hold their show within the boundaries of a very large garden show. It may not be large in the grand scheme of things but their ability to promote the hobby is huge. Maybe because of their show being within a show their impact wasn t noticed immediately, but Dennis Tillbrook reported that when he first arrived at their stand he couldn t really see the fish properly because of a crowd. He went off to another part of the show and returned later. Dennis view was that the CV was as busy as ever if not busier. A few weeks later the MSB club staged their show at a new venue, a venue that was open to the public. For the past few years About Hot Spot their shows have been behind closed doors at one of their members gardens. They sparked a lot of interest in their local area and were very pleased with the number of visitors. A report of this show appears inside this mag. The complaints regarding the falling attendances have been laying the blame at the door of other koi shows, saying that there are too many in too small an area. They also identify clashes with other events as a cause too and the weather. However, recent events have thrown those notions into touch. The last week of August saw three koi clubs stage their annual show. One of them had to compete with the Notting Hill Carnival, and if you re a Londoner you ll know what that means. Nevertheless, two of these clubs are already reporting a success. The North East Koi Club can boast of a 15% increase on their gate figures. The South East Koi Club can only say business as usual. Both, have received positive comments from their dealer fraternity and exhibitors. The hobby is not dead in the UK, just dormant in a few areas. Hot Spot is the on-line version of the South East Section BKKS newsletter called Spotlight, suitably sanitised and denuded of in-house content to make it interesting for other Koi Clubs. However, it will also contain some occasional South East publicity. Hot Spot will be a periodic publication i.e. it will get published when we have enough articles to fill it s 8 pages. Copies of it will reside on the South East s website and will be distributed to other Koi Clubs who indulge us with an exchange of magazines or newsletters. Articles taken from Spotlight are the copyright of the South East Section but may be used by clubs who participate in this exchange. The original text and photos can be obtained via the editors whose details can be found on the back page.

2 Middlesex & Surrey Borders (MSB) 2010 Closed Show. Hotspot 47 explained what the term Closed meant in UK koi circles and for a few years this club took that a stage further and held their actually behind closed doors at the home of one of their members. Then for one mishap or another they went two years without a show. A situation that wasn t what the club wanted so this year they bit the bullet and staged a show that was open to the public. This club has a long history of shows and within their ranks are many with expertise to match, but they were deficit in one are, benching IT. However, they are not without friends in other clubs and were able to call on the assistance of Richard Anders of the South Hants club to fill this hole. In addition, they also brought in Glenys Cambridge and here South Hants benching crew to assist as well. Glenys will by familiar to many Hotspot readers as she is the Show Chairman of the South Hants club as well as the Show Chairman of the koi show held within the FBAS Festival of Fishkeeping., both shows have been covered in this mag since it s inception. Terry Hill, Chairman of the MSB was Glenys s predecessor at the FBAS before Hotspot came on the scene, which is why you won t have read about him before, but he s a former show chairman of high repute in the UK and his input was clearly evident. The MSB s centre ring was different. Each vat had it s own gazebo to provide shade and was separated from its neighbours by a bright pink spacer that ensured the vats were sufficiently far apart to prevent the risk of contamination by splashes. Each of these spacers had their own unique design. Why pink? was a question frequently asked. Terry s on the turn was the equally frequent reply. I have to say that when I heard about it in advance of the show I thought it sounded awful but in situ it looked rather good. I d always thought of pink as a subdued colour but this was in your face pink and stood out to give the show ring a very colourful appearance. Good koi shows in this country seem to thrive on adversity and this show was no exception. However, the problem that befell them was the first of its kind every recorded in the UK. The judges were given the wrong day to attend and hadn t turned up. So after the completion of the benching and the printing of the show statistics and judges lists, etc they were left high and dry and nowhere to go. A radical solution was needed and they turned to Glenys and her assistant Bob Bate along with the BKKS HSC official Rod Taylor and coerced them into assuming the role. A good choice as all have good show credential and understand the mechan -ics and could maintain a degree of impartiality. I got to hear about this the day it happened, I was elsewhere and was due to attend the next day. Not wanting to be drawn into any discussions about the judging I made a mental note to avoid looking at any of the results, and in the main I achieved this, but whilst looking at one vat I saw a stunning Showa that I couldn t help checking up on. It turned out to be the Young Champion, so as far as my Spot-checks went Glen and her team had done a good job. I stayed until the end as I was handing out the trophies and all I spoke to were happy with the way the show had gone. I later learned that a profit was made and the MSB are up for putting on a repeat performance next year. Roll on Young Cham pion Page 2

3 Mature Champion Grand Champion - Adult Champion Role of Honour. Grand Champion - Showa - Frank Chalke. Mature Champion - Showa - Carl Davison Adult Champion - Sanke - Christine Reilly Young Champion - Showa - Glen Mumford Baby Champion - Sanke - Ken Taylor Best Doitsu - Koromo - Terry Hill Best Gin Rin - Showa - Frank Chalke Jumbo - Kawarimono - Luke & Sean Mumford Page 3

4 Young Champion Baby Champion Page 4

5 A very novel game at the MSB show, made by one of their members. Page 5

6 South East Koi Club International Koi Show There are quite a few human interest stories behind this year s crop of champions so I am going to start with them. Our Baby Champion (see page 8) was 35cms Kohaku bred by Maurice & Lynne Cox of Koi UK. It will be Nisai in October. This is the second time a Kohaku of their s has taken this award (the last time was 2008) and therefore a double-whammy for it s owner Stuart Toms who exhibited the 2008 Baby Champ too. Back in 2008 his Baby Champ was the best of 94 exhibits in sizes 1 & 2 and coincidentally it s the same story and the same numbers this year. Same owner, same breeder, same level of competition and the same result. Grand Champion. Size 7 Kohaku Entered by Kevin Green Supplied by Yume Koi Bred by Matsue I m now going to switch direction to the top of the leader board the GC, because Stuart had a hand in this result too. This koi was bought in Japan by Mike Snadden (Yume Koi) in a batch from the breeder Matsue. I am going to condense this story as an article about our GC will appear in a later issue of Koi Carp. In 2006 part of this batch was taken to Stuart s to grow on, or grow out. In return for this service Stuart was offered his choice of the koi for 100. Stuart selected one and grew it on and when he felt it was show ready he entered it into the EMKC Winter show in Feb It was in a class of four and came fourth thus earning no competitive award, however it was given a JSC Certificate of Merit from the judges. Some six weeks prior to the show Stuart sold it to it s present owner Kevin Green who entered it into our show. A bit of a convoluted story that needs further expansion, but for brevity let s concentrate on just one aspect of it. How often does a potential GC change hands for 100? Kevin also brought along our Jumbo. At 93cms it wasn t the longest koi we ve had at the show but it was certainly the biggest in terms of volume. Our Adult Champion is another Matsue Kohaku bought in Japan by it s owner Lee Manning on a buying trip with Nippon Nishikigoi in Lee keeps several show winning kohaku and seems to have the monopoly on the size 5 category having taken the 1 st, 2 nd and 3 rd in our size 5 Kohaku class, and then the 1 st & 2 nd in size 5 overall. Add to this his Adult Champion at this year s BKKS National as well as the Everyman Trophy and we have a name to be reckoned with, especially as several judges remarked that some of these koi are still tategoi. Page 6

7 Mature Champion Size 6 Kinginrin Entered by Lee Jeffery Supplied by Select Nishikigoi Bred by Marudoh Adult Champion Size 5 Kohaku Entered by Lee Manning Supplied by Nippon Nishikigoi Bred by Matsue Our Mature Champion is a Kinginrin Kohaku exhibited by Lee Jeffery, bred by Marudoh in 2002 and supplied by Deron Simons of Select Nishikigoi. As well as picking up the Mature award it was also voted Best Non Go-Sanke by a unanimous vote of the judges. This provoked a bit of controversy as some visitors felt that it s variety is Kohaku, and Kohaku are by definition Go-Sanke. It needs to be pointed out that in a koi show the term Go Sanke applies to the top three Show Classes (Kohaku, Sanke & Showa) not the variety. Nobody queried the Best Non Go-Sanke at the National and that was a Tancho Kohaku (I.E Tancho Class). So it s a universal classification understood by both the BKKS and the international judging community. Lastly, our Young Champion; and this too has a story to tell. Bought by Roy Voller from Select Nishikigoi this Koi No Yohei Hybrid-Koi grew well and blossomed into a buxom female that required spawning. Unable to supply the necessary male koi to provide this service Roy passed it on to his cousin Simon Davis who could. In Simon s care nature took it s course and Simon s husbandry took over from there. On seeing the koi sometime later Roy suggested entering it into the show and predicted that it would do well. He wasn t wrong. These five guys and their koi were among the 38 exhibitors and 276 koi that entered the show. Take up of the show vats this year was brisk and at one time we were looking at extending the centre ring. We very quickly reached full capacity and it wasn t until the fortnight leading up to the show that we received some cancellations which we filled from the waiting list thus maintaining our one man one vat aim. However, a few more cancellations arrived in the few days leading up to the benching deadline which don t allow us to give sufficient notice to cease feeding to prospective replacements and we therefore resorted to plan B and allowed three exhibitors a second vat. We d like to thank those that did cancel for giving us sufficient notice to take remedial action. Thanks to them we had no empty show vats this year. Amongst our exhibitors this year was Per Lindqvist a hobbyist from Sweden who took the opportunity to show the fish he d bought from Select Nishikigoi before having them shipped home. Entering just 3 fish but winning a 1st and a 2nd in class. There wasn t one aspect of this year s show that wasn t affected by the rain. Benching on the Saturday night was brought to a premature close by a short shower. We were benching Alan Coogan s fish at the time and the benching photos looked like they were shot through the sort of rippled glass you find in lavatory windows. A more severe shower interrupted the member s barbecue that night. On the following day judging came to a halt for while as another shower prevented them from actually seeing the koi in the vats. As soon as it diminished enough for visibility to return we supplied them with see-through ponchos and sent them out to complete their task. Rain and a delay in the start of judging kept our International Judging team at work until 7pm. We ran three teams, each comprising of three judges and two trainees. The show has been on the training programme of the Dutch koi society the NVN for three Page 7

8 year s now. This year the Belgian Koi Society sent over two trainees as well and we also got one of the new crop of BKKS trainees involved too. Stefan Malm happened to be the first person I saw after learning that one of our Dutch trainees had stood down. After answering two questions (Want to judge? Got a tie?) with a yes, he joined the team of Belgian, Chinese, Dutch, English and South African judges and got involved. Being Swedish we can now add another nationality to the list of international hobbyists that have graced our show. It s common practise at ZNA show for the owner of the Grand Champion to be presented with a certificate. We decided that it was a good idea too and in the spirit of imitation and innovation (see page 20) we went a bit further and produced one for each of our Major Champions. With a bit of help from Yuko Shirako (ZNA HQ) and some local expertise and flair from David Brown and Mick Preston this was the result. Our winners can be seen on the next page with their s, all framed for the presentation. Young Champion Size 4 Kohaku Entered by Simon Davis Supplied by Select Nishikigoi Bred by Koi No Yohei Baby Champion Size 2 Kohaku Entered by Stuart Toms Supplied and bred by Koi UK Page 8

9 L - R: Stuart Toms, Simon Davis. Lee Manning. Lee Jeffery. And Kevin Green L - R: Bill Ennis, Hongman Leung, Becca Swinnen, Carol McCall, Louis Vanreusel, Tony Sheffield, Mike Harvey, Bart Klingeleers, Ronald Stam, Toën Feyen, Richard Albertsboer, Rudi Van der Broeck, Mark Kleikers and Dirk de Witte. Page 9

10 Role of Honour Grand Champion: Kohaku Size 7 Kevin Green Mature Champion: Kinginrin Size 6 Lee Jeffery Adult Champion: Kohaku Size 5 Lee Manning Young Champion: Kohaku Size 4 Simon Davis Baby Champion: Kohaku Size 2 Stuart Toms Best Non Go-Sanke: Kinginrin Size 6 Lee Jeffery Best Doitsu: Sanke Size 4 Glen Jones & Jackie Porter Jumbo: Hikarimuji Size 7 Kevin Green Selected Variety (Shiro Utsuri) Best Shiro: Size 5 Andy Baker Second: Size 4 Claire & Trevor Farrington Third: Size 3 Kevin Green Friendship Awards. Banana Bar Koi Society: Hikarimuji Size 6 Roy Voller Belgian Koi Society: Koromo Size 1 Stuart Toms Guangdong ZNA: Kohaku Size 7 Steven Anderson KLAN (Germany): Koromo Size 5 C & T Farrington KwaZulu Natal Chapter: Showa Size 5 G. Jones & J. Porter North East: Sanke Size 5 Tom Carey. NVN: Koromo Size 3 Glenn Corkery SAKKS: Koromo Size 1 Stuart Toms Best in Size. First size 1: Koromo Stuart Toms Second: Kohaku Glen Jones & Jackie Porter Third: Sanke Tim Fisher First size 2: Kohaku Stuart Toms Second: Showa Matthew Pearson Third: Kinginrin Dave Newton First size 3: Kohaku Ben Wheeler Second: Kohaku Peter Lewis Third: Utsurimono Kevin Green First size 4: Kohaku Simon Davis Second: Kohaku Ron Rance Third: Kohaku Ben Wheeler First size 5: Kohaku Lee Manning Second: Kohaku Lee Manning Third: Showa Glen Jones & Jackie Porter First size 6: Kinginrin Lee Jeffery Second: Kohaku Tim Fisher Third: Sanke Mick Preston First size 7: Kohaku Lee Jeffery Second: Sanke Lee Jeffery Third: Kohaku Mick Preston Page 10

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13 The 18th Holland Koi Show Mike Harvey A wet start to a successful weekend... Page 13

14 18th Holland Koi Show Mike Harvey In August 2000, Harry Beckx and I were invited to judge at the Holland Koi Show for the first time. I remember being hugely impressed by the beautiful show site, set in the vast gardens of the Kasteeltuinen in Arcen, and the many marquees occupied by dealers from across Holland, Belgium and Germany. I cannot recall the number of visitors that attended the show but it was certainly more than any other koi show I had been to. If you had said to me at the time that this show would grow even more over the years, I would have been very sceptical. But, under the leadership of Toen Feyen over the years, grow it has, with something new being added each year and the number of dealer stands now exceeding 150, with 70 show vats and enough to keep one s interest going for days. This year the show included not only the Holland Koi Show with just under 600 koi entered, but also the Holland Aquarium Show, the Holland Betta Show ( Siamese Fighting Fish) and the Holland Bonsai Show. The entire Holland Aquarium Show and Betta Show was housed in an huge sealed and air-conditioned marquee which kept the temperatures constant. But that was not all there was a dedicated marquee for a Koi University, where lectures were given throughout the weekend by well known koi personalities on a host of subjects. For the first time there was a huge 5m x 3m video screen, weighing 3 tons, suspended 15 metres into the air by a crane and screening advertising of dealers stands and products. This entire show is erected and run with the support of a dedicated and experienced group of volunteers, many of whom have been volunteers for over 15 years or more. The first event of the show is on the Wednesday afternoon when two ZNA Judging seminars are organised to run simultaneously for members and volunteers. Jan Van de Kroon supplied 6 Kohaku and 6 Showa for these seminars, with the two ZNA Judges from Japan running the seminar on the Kohaku and myself, Louis Vanreusel, Bernie Woollands and Christine Woolger running the seminar on the Showa. These seminars are well attended and include the trainee judges from the NVN. On the Thursday all the judges were taken to a facility just outside Venlo where after a cup of coffee we were each given a bicycle and told that we would be going to see some of the local sites. What we were not told as we cycled off was that this involved cycling for some 25 kilometres!!!! On returning to the show site I was delighted to advise Toen that when he comes to our show next year we would have a similar event following the Comrades route starting in Pinetown and heading through the Valley of a Thousand Hills. Judging of the Grand Champions A and B and Supreme Champion (our equivalent of Reserve Grand Champion) takes place on the Friday morning. This year there were 2 ZNA Judges from Japan, 4 BKKS Judges, 2 ZNA Assistant Certified judges ( myself and Dirk De Witte from Belgium), and ZNA Local Certified Judges from China and Belgium. With only these awards to judge on the Friday there was no rush to complete the judging and in the end it came down to essentially 2 candidates for Grand Champion- a Kohaku and a Sanke. When it came to the final voting the Kohaku owned by Harry Van Hout took the top award on a majority vote. The Sanke owned by Jeanne Horne took the Supreme Champion award and Grand Champion B went to a Kinginrin Chagoi, which had retained it s Kinginrin quality amazingly well for its size. Unlike in South Africa the Jumbo Champion is based upon being the largest ( in length) koi on the show and this year it was a huge Ogon that walked away with the award. With the first round of judging over we were free to wander around the show site before going off as a group to play miniature golf, where we soon learnt that most if not all of us were better at judging koi than hitting a golf ball. Grand Champion What a way to start? Saturday morning, on arriving at the show site, the Judges Briefing was held, teams finalised and the sizes to be judge by each team were allocated. In my team were Gary Pritchard (a BKKS judge), Ronald Stam (a NVN Trainee) and Rebecca Swinnen ( a Belgian Koi Society trainee). Judging with Gary, I was again made aware that there are very few differences between ZNA and BKKS judging criteria and in almost every instance our rankings were the same. Judging continued throughout the day ending at around 18h00. Fortunately it only gets dark at around 21h00 at this time of the year. The Saturday night Dinner and Dance was attended by a large contingent of volunteers, dealers, judges and NVN members and is always lots of fun. With a live band, free beer and wine it is a time when everyone can relax and enjoy themselves. Sunday was essentially a free day for the judges, which meant we all had time to take in all the dealers stands, seeing what was new in the way of koi pond accessories etc, admire the fancy goldfish, Siamese Fighting Page 14

15 Supreme Champion Mature Champion Fish, and a wide variety of tropical fish, frogs, shrimps and crabs. The bonsai show was outside in a large area where bonsai were on show as well as having a large retail area from which enthusiasts could select from a wide variety of specimens. Prize Giving started at 16h00 with a short burst of rain, but it soon cleared again and the vast array of trophies were handed out to the many participants. I had select a small Pearl Ginrin Ochiba Shigure for the SAKKS Friendship award. Although small it had perfectly aligned pearl ginrin scales and what made it even more special to me was that it had a beautiful Ochiba Shigure pattern with excellent quality skin and sharp kiwa to the pattern. With Prize Giving over it was time for debenching and as luck would have it the heavens opened and many of those who had entered koi looked like they had been in the vats themselvesdrenched to the bone. I had intended to photograph the Ginrin Ochiba Shigure that I had admired so much, after prizegiving as the koi were Page 15

16 Baby Champion Adult Champion Junior Tategoi Most Unique being debenched, but unfortunately the down pour prevented this. I don t believe that any article on the Holland Koi Show could ever do justice to the spectacle that it is and the immense amount of time and effort that goes into organising and running a show of this size. To everyone who made my stay such an enjoyable one a huge thanks. I hope that the photographs accompanying this article will give readers some small insight into this magnificent show. As they say a picture is worth a thousand words! The Nordic contingent and their prizes Hotspot - the Pag

17 Chris Woolger handing over the SE friendship Trophy The international judging panel and trainees Page 17

18 Role of Honour Grand Champion : Size 7 Kohaku - Harry van Hout Grand Champion B: Size 7 Kinginrin B - Johnny Lievens Supreme Champion: Size 7 Sanke - Jean Hoorne Mature Champion : Size 6 Kohaku - Floor s Koi Shop Adult Champion : Size 3 Kinginrin A - Koi & Vijvercentrum Tiel Baby Champion : Size 2 Kohaku - Dammastaren Senior Tategoi : Size 5 Utsurimono - Quality Koi Junior Tategoi : Size 2 Doitsu A - A & C Koi Most Unique : Size 5 Doitsu B - Koi & Vijvercentrum Tiel Select Variety (Yamabuki) 1st - Size 7 - Bozelie 2nd - Size 6 - Toen Feyen 3rd - Size 5 - Tessa Koi Friendship Awards. KLAN Friendship Award Showa Size 5 van Meegen AKA Friendship Award Kinginrin A Size 3 Jurgen van der Schans A&C en Tessa Koi Award Asagi / Shusui Size 3 Robert Wilke Belgian Koi Society Kawarimono 1 Size 7 J.J. Bonet Guangdong Friendship Kawarimono 1 Size 7 Meckoi/nagelsky Taiwan Friendship Award Doitsu B Size 3 John Leppink South-East Friendship Utsurimono Size 5 Charlotte & Klaus Kwazulu Natal Friendship Kinginrin B Size 1 Synnoeve & Oeystein SAKKS Friendship Doitsu B Size 1 Jeroen van Keulen, NVN Trainee Award Kinginrin A Size 3 Antoon en Riky van Grinsven Koi-Eagle Friendship Koromo/Goshiki Size 3 Willemskoi IKONA Friendship Tancho Size 2 Antoon en Riky van Grinsven BKKS Friendship Award Koromo/Goshiki Size 5 van Meegen Banana Bar Koi Society Doitsu B Size 3 John Leppink Page 18

19 Innovation and imitation. Since the NVN and the South East hooked up as sister clubs back in 2002 a lot of ideas and information has been exchanged, improved and expanded upon. I remember one particular instance back in 2003 when as BKKS PRO I told Toën Feyen that we were planning on organizing seminars for our members. Sadly nothing came of that on the BKKS front but within a year the NVN had four separate seminar topics in their calendar and courses planned for their members throughout that coming winter. Other exchanged notions are more subtle but a casual glance at the centre rings of both shows will show several common factors. However, few are direct copies, a little local pride ensures that good ideas get a little enhancement on the way. Benching info on display at the South East Two years ago our then Show Chair Alan Archer noticed that the NVN displayed benching info that was clearly visible to the visitor. We didn t, and he decided that we should. We made a plan (a good one) to implement it in 2009 but some internal power problems prevented that from happening. However, this year we went ahead and got it right. We could boast that our s is now smarter than their s, but we won t. Their latest innovation was a massive LCD screen suspended some 50ft above the centre ring showing a continuous Power-point presentation repeated hourly, highlighting the dealers present and any special offers they had. As the show progressed the display gave out details and photos of the winning koi. Somehow, I can t see this notion ever being improved upon. However, that doesn t stop the SE from enjoying the benefits. With a bit of teamwork on our part a copy of our show flyer was brought over and put on display for all to see. Page 19

20 2010 Show Dates SEPTEMBER Midland Koi Association Closed Show, 11 & 12th September at Garden Organic, Ryton. UK Koi Philippines 1st Koi Show, 20-26th September, at White Gold Club, Reclamation Area, Cobu City, Phillipines. DECEMBER 46th ZNA All Japan Nishikigoi Show, 3-5th December, at Kochi Castle Park Area, Kochi City, Shikoku District. FEBRUARY nd East Midlands Koi Club Winter Koi Show, 19-20th Febrary, at The Bretby Conference Centre, Burton on Trent, Staffordshire. UK Birmingham & West Midlands Closed Show, 25 & 26th September at Highdown Nurseries, Sugarloaf lane, near Stourbridge DY10 3PA. UK OCTOBER 1st Ever Cambridge Koi Club Closed Show, 2nd October. At Mudds Drive, Threeholes, Cambridgeshire PE14 9JU UK. 18th annual Texas Koi & Fancy Goldfish Society Koi Show, 8-10th October in San Antonio, Texas. see FBAS Festival of Fishkeeping Show 8-10th October, at Mill Rythe Holiday Resort, Havant Road, Hayling Island, Hampshire. PO11 0PB NOVEMBER 4th ZNA NorCal Koi Show, 13th & 14th November, at Holiday Inn San Jose, 1740 North First Street, San Jose, California, USA. Guangdong ZNA (China), 20 & 21st November, Venue tbd If your Koi Show is not found on these ages Don t blame us. We are only an away. Adverts welcomed too. Page 20

21 Hongman trials new health and safety gear. In new Nanny-state UK nobody is immune from the government interference, and koi shows are no exception. Seen here our liveried government official (very apt attire) is demonstrating the new health n safety equipment intended for all koi show attendees by 1/4/2013 (or 4/1/2013 if you re a Yank). About the South East Koi Club. The South East Section was founded in 1981 by a break away group from the London Section. It obtained Section status from the BKKS in 1982 and was expelled in It serves the counties of Kent, East Sussex, Surrey and Berkshire and the southern boroughs of London. It s neighbouring Koi Clubs are the South Kent to the south, Essex to the North, Worthing to the west and the MSB (Middlesex & Surrey Borders) to the northwest. The South East has a pretty stable membership generally numbering about 85 families. Almost since it s founding the SouthEast has participated in information exchange with overseas Koi clubs and continues to do so today. Our Open show is both an attraction to the UK Koi scene as well as Koi keepers from abroad. Every year the show attracts an increasing number of overseas visitors and through them a number of useful connections have been made which enhances our appreciation and understanding of the hobby. The show is always held on the August Public Holiday which generally falls on the last weekend of that month. Details can always be found on our web-site - The South East meets on every 4th Sunday of the month with the exception of December. Our meetings start at 2pm and we endeavour to have a speaker for 2 out of every 3 meetings. Those speakers generally cover Koi related subjects but occasionally we have one that diversifies a little e.g. Bonsai. Our current membership fees are 15 per family and details as well as a schedule of speakers can be found on our web-site. South East contacts in regard to this E-Magazine are :- Koi Clubs participating in this exchange scheme are:- Nishikigoi Vereniging Nederland. Oregon Koi & Watergarden Soc. South African Koi Keepers Soc. NorCal Chapter ZNA (USA) Australian Koi Association AKA Mid Atlantic Koi Club Cambridge Koi Club ZNA Potomac Chapter Essex Section UK Texas Koi & Fancy Goldfish Soc. Cayman Island Koi Keepers Belgian Koi Society Banana Bar Koi Society. East Midlands Koi Club. North East Koi Club UK ZNA Guangdong Chapter. Southern Colorado Koi Club. KLAN (Germany) Koi Galen Sweden ZNA Viet Nam Midwest Pond & Koi Society (USA) Bernie Woollands - bernie@koipin.com and Brian Edwards - brianedw@hotmail.com